Thursday, August 18, 2016

George Foster. You know who George Foster is. I actually already had an IP Foster auto, but it was on one of those K-Mart Topps throwback cards and I never liked those. This was so inexpensive I performed a very rare replacement. My favorite Foster fact is that he was the only player in the entire 1970's decade to hit 50+ home runs in a season. Let's hope the veteran's committee puts him and Davey Concepcion in the Hall of Fame together.

Kenny Kelly played 26 lifetime games for three teams (Rays, Reds, Nationals). Seven of them were with the Reds in '05. He went 3 for 9. Decent.

Freddie Benavides played in 4 seasons for the Reds, Rockies, and Expos. His first two seasons were right after the Reds 1990 World Series, hitting .246 in 98 games.

Bill Gullickson started 64 games for the Reds in '86-'87 amidst a 14-year career with the Expos, Reds, Yankees, Astros, and Tigers. He was 2nd in Rookie of the Year voting in 1980 and finished with 162 career wins.

Thursday, August 11, 2016

Boom. This puts me at 11 of the 23 Reds in the set. One day I will have them all. Then I can start working on the back variations! I pretend I won't. But I will.

As for the player, Spade pitched in 55 games, including 47 starts for the Reds from 1907-1910, going 24-21 with a 2.83 ERA and 113 K's. He then finished his career in the second half of 1910 pitching in 7 games for the St. Louis Browns. When he passed away, he was very poor, so fans raised the money for his funeral, which is fantastic.

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

The Bowman's Best is a 'preview' card, differing only from the regular card via the card number on the back. Score was a little more blatant with their pre-release SAMPLE.

Top left: Finished of my Topps Kids set with that one.
Top right: There were way too many late-80's Fleer sets like this for me to keep track of.
Bottom left: Toys R Us rookie card? Hell yeah.
Bottom right: One of a billion Topps Sticker Backs

A couple of the famed Star cards, but these are the ad-back versions. Which is strange.

And a 1977 Sportscasters Johnny Bench. Goes well with my Johnny Vander Meer from the set. A mammoth 6" x 5" or so. Me like.

Monday, August 8, 2016

I went to a card show two weekends ago. I bought a bunch of Reds autos from a guy, being sure to check my 'haves' list to avoid doubling up. I only wish to have one official and one IP auto of everyone. Among the purchases, this Gary Varsho:

Varsho had an 8 year career, 1 of them in Cincy. Plus it's a Kahn's card, and I love Kahn's cards. But he is also a great TTM guy. So great, in fact, that he was a part of my latest TTM sending spree, a spree I did not sync up with my 'haves' list.

So what comes in the mail three days later? This:

TTM VARSHO OF THE SAME FRICKIN CARD. Unbelievable. Perhaps I will convince myself these are color ink parallels. Standard black and super-rare blue.

Wednesday, August 3, 2016

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Today will be a pile of autos I picked up. I've hit 300 Reds and an additional 100 minor leaguers. Noice.

Craig Tatum. 77 PA in 26 games with the Reds in 2009. Then two years with the Orioles.

Tom Shearn. Entire big league career was 6 starts and a relief appearance with the Reds in 2007.

Mike Lincoln. Two years with the Twins, three with the Pirates, one with the Cardinals, then finished his career with 102 relief appearances for the Reds 2008-2010.

Rob Murphy. Started his 11 year career with 199 relief appearances for Cincy 1985-1988. Then spent time with the Red Sox, Mariners, Astros, Cardinals, Yankees, Dodgers, and Marlins.

Norris Hopper. Spent entire career with the Reds: 440 PA 2006-2008.

Scott "Moneyball" Hatteberg. 1995-2001 with the Red Sox, 2002-2005 with the A', then finished his career with 1,017 PA for the Reds 2006-2008.

Brady Clark. Began his career with 242 PA in Cincy 2000-2002. Then spent six more seasons with the Mets, Brewers, Dodgers, Padres, and Mets again.

Doug Bair. Began with the Pirates in 1976, then the A's, then 220 relief appearances with the Reds from 1978-1981, then nine more seasons with the Cardinals, Tigers, Cardinals again, A's, Phillies, Blue Jays, and the Pirates again.

Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Start off strong with two oddballs. These are from some price guide. They have a 'quick reference' to some choice card prices. Barry Larkin's 1988 Donruss is going for 20 cents! It's a bull market! SELL! SELL!

Donruss Throwback Threads Deion lovin'. Why throw Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders, and Brian Jordan on the same card? Oh right. They all played in the NFL. Got it.

2016 Topps Foil Cozart, Iglesias. Hey, these two are still on the team! Huzzah!

Bowman stuff. Refractor /777. Hometown. Mini.

Bunch of Platinum parallels out of a quarter box. Sure.

I curiously had zero from the UD Special Edition Gold Foil set until now. And remember when companies like Donruss included serialed cards at the tail end of their base sets? I don't, because I wasn't collecting back then. But I bet it was obnoxious.

Colorful chromies. I miss these two dudes.

Closing with some refraction. That top Johnny is a Green Refractor, numbered out of 200. Not a bad quarter box pull. Also not bad: Votto refraction. Shibby.